Samsung's Wi-Fi VoIP mobile pops up on T-Mobile

UMA, eh?

The rumoured Samsung Katalyst slider handset finally appeared on the radar this morning courtesy of a partnership with T-Mobile.

Samsung's Katalyst: Wi-Fi VoIP calls on your home network

Katalyst - or the SGH-T739, to give it its official name - is being marketed principally on its Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA) capability. This allows it to hop between GSM cellular networks and VoIP when it's within range of a Wi-Fi network, placing calls either over your home WLAN or though one of T-Mobile’s own hotspots.

However, if ‘traditional’ calls are more your thing, then its quad-band GSM/GRPS/Edge capabilities should still appeal to you.

The handset has a 176 x 220, 262,144-colour screen. Its 1.3-megapixel snapper won’t replace your digital camera though, but at least the phone accepts Micro SD cards of up to 2GB to store photos and music. The phone also has Bluetooth 2.0 built in.

Samsung claims the Katalyst will give users around five hours of talk time and about 240 hours in standby mode.

The Katalyst is available from today in the US for around $80 (£40/€60), depending on your chosen contract. Unfortunately, there’s been no word of a European release yet.